Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Farmer's Wife—Week 9

Oh, Farmer's Wife, you nagging old broad, you. You were no fun at all this week, I'm sorry to say. I don't think I'd ever put you out to pasture, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't consider it a few times while I was making this week's blocks!

"Corn and Beans." This block was every bit the PITA that I suspected it would be, and more. Cutting out the triangles actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It was matching them all up that gave me fits. Those little triangles are pieced together in rows instead of squares. Maybe I'm just not used to that, but as a result, I thought this block was quite a challenge. I'm glad to have it behind me.

"Contrary Wife." This block really should have been easy, but somehow I ended up unpicking and re-sewing one of the rows three times, because it just wasn't coming together the way I wanted. I guess it just wasn't my day yesterday. Also, this is the first FW block I've done where I really don't like how it looks on point. It's fine straight on, but as soon as you turn it on point, it goes all cock-eyed or something.
And here are a few blocks from last week, which I haven't shared until now.

"Century of Progress": Now this block I love. I paper-pieced this block—it's the first time I've tried that for Farmer's Wife. (I made my own paper-piecing templates by using Adobe Illustrator to manipulate the PDF templates that came with the book.) Paper-piecing may not make sense for every block, but it worked wonders for me on this one. I'm not thrilled with how the points came together in the very center of the block, but other than that I think my points are bang-on, and I could not have managed that with the usual Farmer's Wife templating method. And yes, I also switched up the layout of the prints. As many other bloggers have pointed out, there's something extremely odd about how this block is laid out in the book—it seems to make no logical sense. I swapped things around so that there was more of a pattern to the color layout, and I'm very happy I did.

"Churn Dash": So easy. So happy. Done.

"Cats and Mice": Oh, how I adore what the blue plaid did to this block! It gives it a whole different movement and radiance. Another fun block—just how Farmer's Wife should be. Let's get back to that next week, shall we, you old hag?

25 comments:

Oh, swoon, your Churn Dash and your Century of Progress blocks are stunning!!! I really love the plaid on your Cats & Mice and the movement it brings, and I think your Corn & Beans turned out really well! That was definitely a block that made me grumpy, too. I think I see what you mean about the Contrary Wife - maybe it's the green wavy print that makes it feel kind of cock-eyed? All in all, I think your blocks are looking mighty awesome :)

Your blocks are gorgeous!I've been thinking about switching to paper piecing for most of the rest of my blocks -- I found the paper piecing templates in the Yahoo groups -- haven't tried them out yet, but that could save alot of time over making creating the templates myself. While I think about it, I'm off to make the churn dash block -- I loved yours!

Oh I just love them all! Agreed, on the Corn and Beans. Just ick all around. Yours looks fantastic though! Also I just love your century of progress. like love it so much I want to redo mine in that sort of color pattern. Also I just adore your fabrics, makes me want to shop!

Anonymous, you're right! Thank you for pointing it out. I can't believe I didn't notice it. I think I'm going to have to rip this block up AGAIN and put it together correctly, I bet that will fix my "cock-eyed" problem.

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